Mother of All Demos

In 1968, Douglas Engelbart presented the most amazing tech demonstratoin in history. He showed for the _first_ time:

  • The mouse
  • Hypertext (weblinks)
  • Email
  • Video conferencing
  • Text editing
  • Windowed interfaces
  • Graphics
  • Revision control </ul> This was in an era with punched cards and mainframes. It showed a glimps of the future. </td> </tr>
The Man from the Future

John von Neumann was a genius among geniuses.

Von Neumann would carry on a conversation with my 3-year-old son, and the two of them would talk as equals, and I sometimes wondered if he used the same principle when he talked to the rest of us. - Edward Teller

He either invented or was a major contributor to:

  • quantum mechanics: introduced the concept of a Hilbert space in quantum mechanics.
  • game theory: Co-founded the field of game theory with his 1944 book, Theory of Games and Economic Behavior, co-written with Oskar Morgenstern.
  • computer design: Pioneered the architecture of the modern digital computer (von Neumann architecture)
  • economics: Worked on economic theory, including the development of linear programming.
  • automata theory: Developed the theory of self-replicating machines (cellular automata), which influenced later developments in computer science and artificial life. </ul> </td> </tr> </table>